The District 9S breakout session with James Scanlon was standing room only during a meeting to learn about West Chester schools’ proposed redistricting plan on Wednesday, Oct. 8, 2014. Many of the breakout sessions had a smaller number of residents.

West Chester school redistricting plan gets some bad reviews

Residents and students hold signs at Bayard Rustin High School prior to a meeting to learn about a proposed school boundary redistricting plan on Wednesday, Oct. 8, 2014.

VINNY TENNIS - Daily Local News

The District 9S breakout session with James Scanlon was standing room only during a meeting to learn about West Chester schools’ proposed redistricting plan on Wednesday, Oct. 8, 2014. Many of the breakout sessions had a smaller number of residents.

WESTTOWN >> It didn’t take long for the West Chester Area School District to get live reaction to its newest school boundary redistricting proposal.

Before a meeting on the subject even started Wednesday night at Bayard Rustin High School, about a dozen protesters stood outside with signs and stickers. And they weren’t happy.

“We’ve already made so many friends, how do you expect us to make new ones?” asked protester and Stetson Middle School seventh-grader Isabelle Keefe.

Keefe and her older sister would be moved from Stetson Middle School and Rustin High School to Fugett Middle School and East High School.

The Keefes and their parents were among about 500 people at Rustin for the community meeting the school board was holding for the redistricting plans for the 2015-16 school year. They protested with a group that has called themselves “9S” after the name the school district has given their Westtown neighborhood on the proposed maps.

Barbara Meisinger, a parent of a fifth-grader at Westtown-Thornbury Elementary School and a ninth-grader at Rustin High School, protested the redistricting because her children would also have to move to Fugett and East from Stetson and Rustin.

Her ninth-grade son, who plays ice hockey at Rustin, would be grandfathered in under the rule that stipulates any current high school student can stay at their school provided they can make their own transportation routes. Meisinger said she would have to drive her son to school, but it would be difficult considering she has a full-time job.

“We bought a house based on schools,” Meisinger said.

She and her family moved recently to one side of Westtown Road so her children would stay in the Westtown-Thornbury, Stetson, Rustin route.

Donning “9S” stickers, Meisinger and most of the parents at the community meeting sat in groups dotted throughout the high school’s auditorium to hear the school board’s reasoning for redistricting their group.

Superintendent James Scanlon, who released a letter to parents on the subject as well as proposed redistricting maps Friday, Oct. 3, said the meeting was intended to explore the community feedback on the situation as well as to explain the school board’s reasoning for the current proposal.

“I’m a big believer in process and I’m a big believer in community input,” Scanlon said at the meeting.

Scanlon said the primary motivations for redistricting and choosing the areas used in the maps was overcrowding at some schools, excess space at many elementary schools and to develop a balance in the number of students with free or reduced-price lunches at all schools.

He also added that the middle schools are holding some of the largest classes they’ve ever held while enrollment in elementary schools is dropping.

Stetson’s sixth-grade class, for instance, is currently the biggest sixth-grade class there has ever been in the district, he said.

“We have a logjam and a bottleneck at our middle schools,” he said.

The school board’s goal, Scanlon said, is to have schools at 85 to 90 percent of their capacity, which it is currently over or under at many schools.

The most severe gap is at East Bradford Elementary School, the school that recently received $11 million in renovations, which is currently at 60 percent of its available capacity.

The school board also wants each school to carry 10 percent to 20 percent of students with subsidized lunches to provide for more economic diversity among students, Scanlon said. Currently, the percentages range from 7.3 percent to 28.6 percent at schools.

Scanlon emphasized that the new plans, which would affect 855 students, were not final and rather “a work in progress” to be further revised and discussed at another community meeting before Scanlon makes his recommendation to the board on Dec. 15.

After Scanlon spoke to the community at large, he broke the meeting into 10 different breakout sessions for areas that would be affected.

The largest group were the roughly 100 “9S” protesters who met with Scanlon in their breakout session to discuss the 49 elementary school students who would be moved from Westtown-Thornbury to Glen Acres, the 28 students who would be moved from Stetson to Fugett and the 26 students moved from Rustin to East, provided they do not take advantage of the grandfather clause.

Because this area was moved when Rustin opened in 2006, many parents were frustrated that they were being targeted again for redistricting.

Stacey Watson, a resident whose children will be affected by the changes, said she was disappointed with the district’s proposal, considering all her area had done for Rustin when it was starting out in 2006, and she was unsure of why they were being picked again and not another area.

“There’s 360 degrees in a circle, not just one,” Watson said.

She said she felt like their area was a “throwaway neighborhood.”

Many other parents were upset by the decision to shift students to balance out the student subsidized lunches, when they, as parents, and the taxpayers who ultimately fund those lunches, had no problem with the current situation.

Of the many reasons the neighbors and parents listed as issues, Scanlon said he and the steering committee would look into the issues further as well as a transition plans in their meetings.

The next community meeting is scheduled to be held at 7 p.m. on Wednesday, Nov. 5, at East High School before Scanlon makes his final recommendation on Dec. 15.